Griefer Bait

My little girl seems to attract griefers for some reason. It probably comes down to being in the wrong place at the wrong time. I can't help but sympathize with her. She doesn't bring this stuff on herself in any way, it just happens.

Last night, after supper, she played SoT for about 30-45 minutes. After logging in and running around the outpost to collect supplies, she noticed another sloop sailing towards the docks. Once in range, the sloop proceeded to shell her boat. Hoping to avoid a confrontation, she scuttled her ship and went up to the tavern to wait for the guy to leave.

Long story short, he didn't leave. In fact, he anchored his sloop next to her mermaid and camped the spot with his eye of reach (ie, sniper rifle). Whenever she'd come out to see if he was gone, or to try and get to her mermaid, he'd shoot at her. Eventually he shot and killed her.

What the hell kind of sociopathic crap is that? It's not enough to sink someone's sloop before they've even left the dock, but you have to make sure you kill them, too?

I don't think my daughter gets too upset over these things. She's come to accept the possibility, but she doesn't enjoy it when it becomes the reality. She eventually respawned at a small island, then (just to see if she could) swam to another island she saw in the distance (killing two sharks on the way). After that, she went back to her ship and sailed to the secret island at N10 to explore.

I played for about an hour, myself. I managed to complete a profitable Merchant Alliance voyage (thank God for gold snakes!). It took me the whole hour, though, because I couldn't find chickens anywhere. I eventually turned in my snakes just to avoid losing them to some random dweeb before canvassing several islands for poultry products. Eventually I found the birds, but it took more time than I would've liked.

Avast!

Weekend Retrospective

I doubt I'll ever go back to my detailed logs, but I do have some anecdotes to share from this past weekend.

I had a couple of fairly positive encounters that didn't end in immediate death for me. In both instances, I'm certain I would've been attacked and killed had I not spoken up prior to the first shots being fired. That said, once the dialogue started in both cases, things were pretty laid back.

In the first instance, I was bringing in a load of chickens and snakes to the Merchant Alliance at one outpost or another. As I was docking, I noticed a couple of mermaids in the water. I'd seen a couple of sloops in the area earlier, so I figured maybe there were some castaways waiting in ambush for anyone foolish enough to drop anchor.

FinessingOnHer, J2D2S2, and Otar311 rocking out.

I'm not sure how correct I was, but after turning in my first snake, three fellows came rushing down the dock towards me with cutlasses at the ready. I told them I was turning in a Merchant Alliance voyage and that I had nothing of value. Though only one of them (Otar311) could talk to me for some weird technical reason, he was laid back and acted as a translator of sorts for the group.

The three had met earlier when one of them had been killed by the other two. While two of them were on the Ferry of the damned, he said, "I guess that means you don't want my help with the raid." Eventually, though, they got together and worked to take out the skeletons and had just returned to turn in their loot before logging out. They marveled at my snakes and we chatted a little bit.

The next encounter had a similar genesis, as I was docking at an outpost to turn in some additional livestock to the Merchant Alliance. I'd seen a galleon near the outpost previously and I waited for it to leave before heading over to complete my voyage. As I was unloading, I heard a child's voice - a boy, probably around 8 years old - saying, "His anchor's down. He's just sitting there. Should I use my sniper on him?" Checking the horizon, I could see the galleon coming back to the outpost.

I could hear other voices, fainter than the boy's, so I immediately began to reply. "Hey, guys. Guys? I'm just trading in chickens and pigs here. I don't have anything worth taking."

DEZiR3 Allstar and TheKoesegPro (obscured).

At this point the boy, DEZiR3 Allstar, leapt from the galleon and swam to my ship. "I'm coming aboard!" he said. "Don't kill me!" As he climbs aboard, he pulls out his blunderbuss and points it at me.

"Don't you kill me," I replied. "I have a Seafarer's Chest in the hold if you guys want it. Everything else is chickens and pigs."

The apparent leader of the crew, TheKoesegPro, told everyone to let me turn in my stuff as DEZiR3 grabbed the aforementioned chest and ran off to sell it. The rest of the crew helped me unload my ship, leaving the animals on the dock near the Merchant Alliance rep.

As they told it, they were prepping to raid a skeleton fort and asked me if I'd like to join them in my sloop. I thanked them for the offer but replied in the negative, letting them know I was focused on Merchant Alliance quests. KoesegPro even sent me a friend request before calling his crew back to their ship.

They started to pull out to sea. I could hear DEZiR3 (still louder on his mic than the rest) asking, "Want me to go back and kill him?"

I spoke up. "You know I can hear you, right?" which was punctuated by laughter from the rest of the crew as if to say, "Oh, that DEZiR3! Such a funny kid!" They went on their merry way and that was that.

My snake collection.

While I was having such positive encounters with other members of the community, my kids were having different experiences. My daughter was ganked for the first time, much to her chagrin. She had nothing of value aboard her sloop, but while she was on the Ferry of the Damned, waiting to respawn, her killer took all of her bananas.

Upon discovering her sudden lack of bananas, she exclaimed, "He stole my bananas! What a douchebag! I mean, what kind of person does that?" She complained long and loud about it, wondering aloud why people have to ruin other peoples' fun. I reminded her that it was just bananas and that she should be grateful.


In other news, I discovered an island at N10 that doesn't appear on the map. It was small and I didn't find anything interesting there. Maybe I should have looked harder, I don't know. I'll go back and check it out again later, just to be sure.

The latest patch dropped yesterday. I'm ambivalent about it, though I like the thought of new cosmetic items. I'm not real keen on having the items distributed between different outposts, but I can understand what Rare is going for. I still think stuff is either far too expensive, or that gold rewards are far too low. That's just the way it is, I guess.

Avast!